Six DMDK legislators suspended from TN Assembly

Chennai: Six members of Tamil Nadu`s main opposition party DMDK were suspended on Monday for one year for attacking a rebel member in the assembly last month, leading to a walk-out by major opposition parties in protest against the decision.

The suspension decision was announced by assembly Speaker P Dhanapal following which members of opposition parties like DMK, Congress and the Communist party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) staged a walk out.

The six DMDK legislators who were handed out the suspension for attacking rebel member S Michael Rayappan in the assembly are: VC Chandirakumar, K Nallathambi, D Murugesan, S Senthil Kumar, B Parthasarathy and R Arulselvan.

Trouble started on the last day of the assembly session last month with DMDK rebel legislator K Tamil Azhagan claiming that he has earned a good name in his Tittagudi constituency after he met Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa for carrying out welfare measures.

Along with Azhagan, Sundarrajan representing Madurai Central, Rayappan from Radhapuram and Arun Pandian from Peravurani met Jayalalithaa October last year, and since then they have been functioning as a separate group supporting the ruling AIADMK.

The DMDK members then started shouting and dashed towards Azhagan after he asked them to follow in his footsteps to earn people`s goodwill.

Rayappan tried to stop them but they began hitting him. He was rescued by other members of the house while the speaker ordered eviction of the DMDK members, describing the attack as shameful.

While the AIADMK has a strength of 150 (excluding the speaker) in the 235-member house, the DMDK has 29 legislators and the DMK 23.